Design, Tech, Art, and Business

Instagram on Windows 95?

Imagine searching through the Instagram explore page while using your very first computer… Woah. The way these kids nowadays are born into their Instagram accounts, would have been the same for the Windows 95 generation of earlier–except in more pixelated graphics and possibly some film scan posts?? Me either. I couldn’t have even imagined so. I was too busy looking for Carmen Sandiego.

However, Russian artist, Misha Petrick, decided to find out what it’d look like if it had been launched over 20 years ago, and instead of being an phone app it had been a Windows 95 program.

Petrick created a bunch of mockup animations showing how the popular photo-sharing app would look had it been confined to the graphic user-interface (GUI) of Microsoft’s early, now iconic, operating system.

And it doesn’t look like the most user-friendly experience. But then again, there weren’t as many UX jobs then. User experience as we know it is fairly new, however, its multidisciplinary history can be traced far back.

For example, Frederick Winslow Taylor, a mechanical engineer and one of the first management consultants, authored “The Principles of Scientific Management,” a widely influential study of engineering efficiency. Along with Henry Ford’s pioneering mass-production techniques, Taylor and his supporters shaped the early vision of what interactions between laborers and their tools should be like. Fast-forward to our digital-first world, Instagram is integral for all graphic-artists. At the least bit a guide to how to promote work.

Windows 95’s limited color palette and pixelated fonts, combined with Considering the minimal processing power of desktop PCs 20 years ago–this would have been a great range of filters. As feed limited to animated GIFs and low-res clipart would have been way ahead of its time, nonetheless.

Let’s be honest, GIFs still rock! I’m not sure about pixelations though…

Check it out below:

The implication of “user-experience” is that a user’s experience is and can be further designed. Today, UX is an integral part of design discipline and continues to further its boundaries.

Here’s how Instagram’s filter selection process would look on Windows as according to Petrick:

Lastly, here’s how you’d get notified you received a like on one of your many, many selfies on Windows 95.

Check out more of Misha Petrick’s work here (in case you didn’t click it up top).